


Knowing Her

by turtlebook



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Demon Summoning, F/F, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-10-31
Packaged: 2019-01-22 11:05:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12480152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/turtlebook/pseuds/turtlebook
Summary: Maze can't shake the feeling she knows Linda from somewhere. Somewhereelse.





	Knowing Her

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thesleepingsatellite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesleepingsatellite/gifts).



> Set around season one/two-ish.

The demon Mazikeen took pride in her work. 

"Another day, another tormented soul," she said with a satisfied smile. 

Not that there were _days_ in Hell; time was really more of a mortal-plane-of-existence thing. Here in the afterlife things like time and space were a little less strictly defined. 

"But you know what I mean," she added. Her audience - the aforementioned tormented soul, currently stretched taut on the rack - groaned. "That's what I like to hear. Now, what's your pleasure, the pincers or the poker?" Mazikeen walked over to the conveniently placed iron brazier and contemplated the white hot implements ready and waiting. There was another groan. "Hm. Why not both?"

As she reached into the flames there was a sudden shift, a rending of the fabric between worlds, and her hand passed through the poker like it wasn't there. 

"What the..."

It was quickly apparent that it was not the poker but her own hand that had become insubstantial. She was being pulled away, losing touch with the hellspace she called home, as a sound like thunder in her bones echoed through her.

_I summon thee._

*

"Maze? Maze. Oh for - never mind, I'll tend to my own drink, shall I? That's fine, only the Lord of Hell, why would I have people to do these sorts of things for me?"

Maze wasn't listening to him. That had been happening more and more often of late. He didn't care for it, frankly, but that was demons for you. Once he had prepared his drink to his liking, Maze _still_ wasn't paying attention to him.

"Well, what is it?" he said. "You're staring at our lovely psychologist over there with that look in your eye. What is it you have in mind, torture? Sex?"

That got Maze's attention, briefly. "No."

"Both, then."

"This isn't my sexy torture look."

"I'm sorry, wasn't aware you had any other kind."

Maze went back to ignoring him, while resuming her little staring game. He was just about to leave her to it when she spoke. "Sometimes I just feel like I know her from somewhere."

"Who, the good Doctor? Well, yes. She's my therapist. You know her from therapy."

"No," she said. A brief turn of her head in his direction allowed him to see Maze's expression was indeed neither particularly sexy nor tortuous. "Somewhere else."

"There is no somewhere else. We came to the Earthly realm, I opened a bar and started therapy and, well, my bartender and my therapist quite naturally became acquainted."

With a noise of disgust Maze moved down to the other end of the bar to stare in peace.

Lucifer shrugged and decided to forget about it, but Maze didn't.

*

Her vision blurred for a moment. She thought she must be about to fall in a faint - the blood loss, surely. The cut had been small but the knife was sharp. She would wake in a heap on the floor with a wounded wrist to bind and feeling silly for her fanciful notion that these mouldering books contained anything but a load of hogswash.

Once her eyes cleared, however, she was still standing steady on her own two feet. What she saw then might have indeed knocked her flat. 

The hidden attic room had been empty but for herself and the spiders scuttling in the rafters, but now it was not. The magic circle clumsily inscribed on the uneven floorboards in chalk had been unoccupied... _But now it was not._

She drew in a sharp breath, realising the air was heavy with the smell of sulphur and smoke. Her gasp was loud in the otherwise quiet room, and the demon - because that is what it must be, that is what the spell had brought forth, that is what the book _said_ would happen - the demon turned and regarded her with piercing eyes and a twisting smile.

"You called?" the demon said.

"I - I did," she replied.

*

Maze didn't exactly forget the feeling that she knew Linda somehow, it was always kind of there, but she moved on to other things, like being _friends_ with Linda, which seemed more important. Friends were good things to have, she was discovering.

Then she started having dreams.

The dreams were about Linda. Except they weren't about Linda, or they were, but not Linda with her glasses and pencil skirts and tight blouses, sitting calmly in her office, Doctor let's-try-to-be-professional-about-this Linda.

Actually, Linda in her dreams didn't look much like Linda at all, but Maze still knew it was her, even with a different face, in a dull brown dress covering her from ankles to neck, surrounded by musty books and inkwells, squinting over parchment by candlelight. 

She dreamed of a cup full of blood, fresh from the vein, and a silver dagger, and a voice speaking words that called to her across time and space. _Mazikeen._

She always woke up with the urge to go to her. To Linda. 

Really, it took _way_ too long for her to figure it out. But one night, after she almost hurled herself out of bed ready to bolt in the direction of the nearest tiny blonde psychologist, it finally clicked.

"Shit, that was her?" 

Sitting there in the dark, Maze slowly turned over this new information in her head. She gave the matter a lot of consideration because this was important. Linda was important. 

When she was done, things made a lot more sense. Now all she had to do was tell Linda.

*

One moment she had been in Hell, the next - well, this wasn't exactly an improvement. It was certainly nowhere of her choosing, and that was bad enough.

Mazikeen raised her hands to press against the limits of the binding spell, encountering only resistance, knowing it would not give way. She was bound here within the circle until the deal was struck. 

She eyed the nervous human who was observing her warily in turn, and she wondered what it would be this time. These humans always wanted something. There was always a deal to be made.

She smiled. "Well, small one. Here I am. What is your will?"

*

Seated in her office in their usual places, Linda in her chair, Maze reclining on the sofa like she owned the place, Linda listened silently to yet another mind-melting truth bomb about the nature of life and death and the universe and existence in general. All heavy topics for a Tuesday afternoon but Linda was sort of getting used to it.

Except that this time it was especially disconcerting because it involved her, personally. Her own life and death and afterlife and... Past life? Pre-life? Was that a thing?

"I need a moment to process this," Linda said.

"Take your time." Maze stopped talking. For five seconds. "I mean, hey, if you're gonna summon a demon, old you picked a good one. Me."

"I can agree with the sentiment. Still not sure about the premise." Linda took a deep breath. Didn't quite do it, so she took another. "Okay. I think I remember enough of my Goethe here. And assuming this is true, what you're saying, then I have to ask: did I, or did I not, sell you my soul."

"You did!"

"Oh -"

"Not."

"My _god_. Maze. Not funny."

Maze laughed like a hyena.

Linda leaned back in her chair and put her hands over her eyes. "I'm going to need another moment."

*

The demon was beautiful. And female. She didn't appear monstrous in any way, except, perhaps, for a certain unearthly gleam in her eye, and the strange black garments she wore - which were rather immodest. She didn't know why on earth she would expect modesty from a demon, but then, she hadn't really expected any of this, truly.

"Are you real?" Perhaps, after all, she had fainted and struck her head on the floor. 

"Come a little closer and see for yourself," the demon said.

She wanted to. She was admittedly intrigued, but not quite so foolish as all that. "I'm sorry, you are just... not at all what I expected a dark spirit of the underworld to be."

"No?"

"You... are a beautiful woman. Oh dear."

"This displeases you?"

"For a demon to take the form of a beautiful woman - well, perhaps the parish priest is right about the female sex after all."

"The priest knows nothing."

"You know the local priest?"

The demon smirked. "I don't need to."

She found herself smiling a little in response. Feeling braver, she took a single step closer, and then another, until she had drawn near enough that the two of them might reach out and easily join hands.

"Tell me, what do you really think of your demon?"

"Beautiful. Fascinating. Frightening."

"What do you have to fear? I am here at your bidding."

"I don't know what will happen, what you will do, what dark powers you possess." 

The demon leaned forward, her hand beginning to reach out. "But you want to find out, don't you?"

*

"It's just... Reincarnation. Really. That's a thing now."

Maze shrugged. "Always been a thing, that's kind of how it works. Not for everyone, just some of you. Hey, I'm not an expert but it's like, some people are done after just the one go round. Others go back for seconds. Or thirds. Or however many times."

"And that's me. I'm not - this isn't - I've had other lives in the past? Okay, that's not so weird, I'm open-minded, I can adjust to new information."

"You're freaking out."

Linda held up a hand. "Not so much about the reincarnation. The other stuff. Are you _sure_ I didn't sell my soul to you or Mephistopheles or -"

"That little twerp?" 

"I'm freaking out, yes, okay?" Linda threw up her hands. "Would you mind just -"

"Relax, the only one who can trade in souls is... Well, you've met him."

"Lucifer."

"You're fine. Your soul is still in there. When we met, you and me, back in the day? It wasn't about your soul. It was about mine." There was a pause. "Another moment, huh?" 

"Please."

*

It was now one hour and several minutes past midnight - for this was the time stated to be best for summoning spells, when the walls between worlds were weakest, allowing for ease of passage. 

Neglected candles guttered in pools of wax dripping down the sides of burnished holders. The flickering light cast unsteady shadows on the walls that grew and waned in strange formations as human and demon continued to regard each other.

"I never expected..."

Mazikeen lifted her brow. "Me?" 

"Anything. It was only a magic spell from a dusty old book I found hidden behind a wall." She laughed nervously. "That sounds quite silly now I hear it aloud. But I thought surely it would come to nothing, I was just curious."

"Curious enough to make a blood offering to call up a demon from Hell." 

She brushed her thumb over the cut on her wrist. It stung, but had ceased to bleed. "Oh, but what do they say about curiosity?"

"What do they say?"

"Nothing good. Much like idle hands..."

"All right, it's been nice chatting, but enough. Ask."

"Ask?"

"Yes. You called me, and here I am. What do you want?" Mazikeen waited but there was no response. "You want something - riches, power, sex, revenge. An enemy destroyed. A woman in your bed. Or a man? Either or both - you just have to tell me, and then we can talk terms."

"But I don't want any of those things. I just... wanted to _know_."

*

Maze leaned forward, elbows on her knees. "Look, here's how it works. Demons don't really love being summoned by some puny mortal who wants to make them their bitch, right? These things pretty much always go bad."

"Like, Faust bad?" Linda clarified. "Dragged into hell screaming bad?"

"Bad for the mortal, fun for us. You humans, always getting in over your heads. Throw in a pissed off demon with zero motivation to let 'em off easy... You were different, though."

"How?"

"You didn't want anything. You didn't summon me out of greed or ambition. You were just curious. It was sweet." Maze smiled, then realised what she was doing and cleared her throat. "Anyway, that's where it usually goes bad for the summoner - they want something. They have this demon on their hands and they think they can control it. Newsflash: they never can."

"So what happened? With me, I mean. Past me."

"You really want to know?" Linda nodded. Maze reached out her hand. "Then c'mere."

"Why?" Linda asked, even as she automatically placed her hand in Maze's. Because why wouldn't she? Maze gave her hand a tug, and then more firmly pulled on her arm until Linda had to move or be pulled out of her seat. "What? Oh, okay, all right." She was drawn over to sit on the sofa beside Maze, which was fine, although she wasn't sure why.

"So, what happened between you and her?" she prompted, finding herself slightly distracted by the way Maze was still holding her hand, thumb lightly brushing over her knuckles. "My past self, I mean. Whatever."

"You set me free," Maze said, as she leaned over and pressed her lips to Linda's.

Linda, surprised, froze for a second and then pulled back. "What was that?"

Maze was looking at her intently. Seriously. And Maze was hardly ever serious about anything that didn't involve aggression, but there was no hint of anger in her right now, but rather the exact opposite. "I wish you could remember it, " she said, her smile almost wistful. "It was really something."

"I wish I could, too."

"Hey, you will once you're dead. All your past lives will come back to you."

"I mean, that's nice, but not really helpful right now. I suppose I'll just have to take your word for it about all of this."

"You trust me?"

"Yes. I do. I mean, I'm assuming this isn't some big ruse."

Maze ginned at that. "Be a pretty great pick-up line. Hey babe, you summoned me in a past life. Think you can make me come again?" Maze leaned in as before but this time Linda didn't freeze, she held up her hand and gently but firmly pushed Maze back. Maze frowned. "Except this isn't a pick up line, you know that, right?"

"Then what is it?" Linda said.

Maze thought about her answer for a second, and said: "Real. It's real."

*

"Oh, no, no, I - I didn't mean to, a-and I do not want to - to keep you against your will. I release you from any obligation, of course, I hope this wasn't too much of a bother, I imagine there to be much else you'd rather be doing, or that you should be doing... What does one such as yourself do, exactly?" She was babbling because suddenly, somehow, the spell was broken and the demon stepped forth from the circle of chalk as if it was nothing. 

She backed away until a table was at her back and she could retreat no further.

"In Hell?" Mazikeen said as she stalked slowly forward. "What do you think I do?"

"Er, torment the souls of the damned?" 

"Don't be too afraid, little one. You are not damned, I won't torment you."

"Oh?" It came out as a squeak as Mazikeen came close enough to touch. A hand lifted and brushed a loose strand of hair, pale gold, away from her face.

"Not too much."

*

"I'm not sure what to say."

Maze frowned. "Listen, I'm not great with this sort of thing. Guess it was so obvious even I could figure it out. I have a thing for you. Because you were good to me then, and you're good to me now and -"

"Whoa, wait, that's gratitude, Maze, not desire, or love."

Linda was looking at her kindly, sympathetically, not any of the ways Maze wanted Linda to be looking at her right now.

"Hey, I wanna jump your bones, but not because I feel like I owe you. I think you're freakin' perfect. You're the best human I know, at least out of the adults, anyway. And you've got a nice ass, but I don't just want to do you, I mean you're so - what's that thing where you see a baby animal or something and you just want to squish it to death?"

"You think I'm cute?"

"That's it. But I don't want to squish you, I want to hug you forever and make sure no one ever touches a hair on your damn head because if they did I'd have to kill them. I don't see other people the way I see you. I have these..."

"Problems? Urges? ...Knives?"

"Feelings. Come on, Linda, you're the one usually trying to tell me about this stuff." 

"You have feelings for me, is that what you're saying?"

"Obviously, jeez. Do you have them for me?"

"You're very special to me, Maze."

"Hey, even I know there's good special and bad special."

"Good special."

"Sexy special?"

"I -"

"Hang on. Just let me..." Maze tipped her chin up and Linda's eyes fluttered shut as Maze slipped her the tongue.

It was a sure bet. The things she could do with her tongue could - and had on a couple occasions - make Lucifer himself blush. 

"Oh," Linda said when Maze drew back.

"Sexy special. I knew it."

"Well... I just... don't want to be a bad friend. Or take advantage of you." 

"I'm not a poor little lost soul, Linda. You helped me out when I needed it, but I don't need your help now. What I need is to show you how I feel, preferably by going down on you until you pass out. I need you to let me love you and I need you to love me back."

A smile was growing on Linda's face. "You're amazing, you know that? No pun intended."

This time when Maze leaned, Linda leaned, too. The kiss started out a sweet brushing of lips but quickly deepened until Linda broke away panting, her glasses askew.

"I've never actually been with a woman."

Maze grinned wolfishly. "That's what you said last time."

"You mean we - you and past me -?"

"You let me go. Had to give you something to remember me by."

"Oh."

"This time I'm not going anywhere, if that's okay with you."

Linda brought her hands up to Maze's face, brushing her hair aside with gentle fingers. She smiled slowly. "I think it is. I think it really is." Her smile suddenly became a wide, wicked grin as she swung a leg over Maze's lap and straddled her, taking Maze's hands in hers and directing them to her butt. She took off her glasses and pulled out her hair, setting both glasses and hair-tie over on the end table. With a toss of her loose hair she was ready to go, and focused back on Maze. "Now, kiss me again."

Maze squeezed her butt. "Still like to be on top, huh?"

"Oh, I definitely do."

Maze gave her butt a smack. "We'll see about that."

"I guess we will."

Then they were kissing again, and it was an amazing kiss, like they'd been doing this for a lifetime or more.

*

Maze came in one night while Lucifer was sitting at his piano, brooding in the dark.

"Hey," she said. "You know how we're, you know, you and me."

He straightened. "Yes, of course I do. I thought we had that settled."

"We do, this isn't about that."

"Good."

"This is about Linda."

"Right," he said, reaching for his glass of scotch from the piano top. He took a sip. "What about her?"

"It's you and me, always. But... it's me and her, too."

"Oh, I see. Well. Also good. So you finally figured it out, hm?"

"You knew?"

"That's she's an old soul? Please, Maze, who do you think you're talking to? Besides, you said you knew her before, and there are only so many ways you might have met each other _before_. She isn't a divine being, and she wasn't one of the naughty humans in Hell with us, therefore, narrowing down the possibilities, you must have somehow gone to her."

"Could have told me."

"You figured it out for yourself, didn't you? Wasn't that more satisfying? Yes? You're welcome. Now let me pour you a drink."

She pushed off the piano. "Can't. I've got a date. A hot one."

"Now _that's_ your sexy torture look."

Maze neither confirmed nor denied it, but her grin as she left said it all.


End file.
